Electricity is an essential part of modern life but, according to figures from the World Bank, about 1.1bn people (14% of the world’s population) don’t have access to it. This is partly due to economics, with energy shortages rife in the poorest parts of the world, including sub-Saharan Africa and many parts of Asia. But there are also practical issues: building energy infrastructure for rural villages, connecting small islands to grids or running powerlines over mountain ranges – these are not easy feats.
John Hingley, founder and CEO of Renovagen, encountered these issues first-hand when travelling across the Himalayas. The engineer was using a small, portable solar panel to charge his laptop and mobile phone. This inspired him to create a larger, but also portable, solar panel array that can be rolled up like a carpet and assembled in minutes. Renovagen’s solar powered packs have been used in live exercises by Nato and the British Army, proving their worth in the most difficult scenarios. “The world’s most inaccessible areas are not just geographically remote, they also suffer from difficult terrain and security problems, such as war,” says Hingley.
The business recently completed a project with Cardiff council to bring power to Flat Holm island, a small but significant nature reserve in the Bristol Channel. Providing power to the island’s handful of inhabitants, mostly scientists and conservationists, had historically been difficult, so the council engaged Hingley and his team to install one of its solar arrays.
“We needed to create a solution that could fit on a boat and then be taken ashore quickly, says Hingley. “It took us one hour to land the system on the beach, reposition to the other side of the island, unroll the solar and switch on. Time was limited, as we had to leave the island on the same day and there is only a short window of about 30 minutes on each tide when a boat can land.”
Now the solar array and battery pack is running, life is very different for the people working on the island. “The solar array can generate up to 7.2kW and we also provided battery storage, which will last for 24 hours. It will provide enough power for kettles, household needs, TVs and computers, and also for an immersion heater, which means anyone on the island can have a hot shower.”
Renovagen has already raised almost £1m of equity investment via the Crowdcube platform, but is now on the funding trail again and has a new market in its sights.
“We had a lot of calls from people in the Caribbean following the hurricane. I believe technology could be very useful in disaster recovery, but also in disaster resilience. The solar panels could be rolled up prior to a hurricane and kept safe in protective shells. Then, after the hurricane has passed, they can be redeployed to provide much-needed power,” says Hingley.
Waste as a resource
According to the World Bank, 1.2 billion people don’t have access to reliable sources of energy, with many in rural areas still lacking power.
Sandra Sassow, CEO of Seab Energy, is currently working with the Indian government to address this issue, as well as tackling water shortages. She says the government is proactively trying to solve rural problems, as India’s cities cannot cope with more people.
“India wants to retain people in the villages and needs to find ways to make life better for them. Otherwise, people will keep on moving to the cities and [populations] will just explode,” explains Sassow.
Her business has developed a miniaturised anaerobic digestion (AD) device that converts organic waste into energy, fertiliser and clean water. The unit fits inside a standard shipping container and can be transported on the back of a truck. The Southampton-based business is working with the regional government of Andhra Pradesh to bring its AD units to villages in the region.
“The villages have no sewage treatment services, also there’s a lack of water. You hear about monsoons affecting India, but that’s only for a short part of the year – there are water shortages too. Our units convert sewage into energy, fertiliser and also water, which is usable for watering crops and irrigation,” she says.
Seab Energy has four units in operation in the UK, including one with the NHS in Southampton, with a further eight set to be installed by the end of the year. Typically, these “Muckbuster” units put electricity into the grid. However, remote villages lack electricity grids, so alternatives are being considered. “It might be that there is a small grid and electricity can be supplied to homes. The other way is to create gas and then bottle it,” says Sassow.
The concept is not exclusive to India – it can also be used in African villages or Chinese ones. “We are aiming to create a model that will demonstrate a way to bring power to all sorts of remote and hard-to-get to places,” she adds.
A greener gas
Enass Abo-Hamed is CEO of H2GO Power, a Cambridge University spin-out that has developed a way to create and store hydrogen in its solid state.
This means the hydrogen is far safer as it cannot explode, so can be stored close to where it will be used. The Palestinian entrepreneur, who is an enterprise fellow of the Royal Academy of Engineering and a technology consultant to the European Commission, wants to see her technology used to power electricity generators in the developing world.
“They have the most pressing needs,” she says. “Many people in the developing world do not even have access to electricity. In Nigeria, for instance, more than half of the population is not connected to the grid and hospitals are subject to regular blackouts.”
H2GO is developing a unit – about the size of a shipping container – that can perform electrolysis: the process that splits water into hydrogen and oxygen. The unit then stores the hydrogen and converts it into electricity once it is required.
“We can use excess renewable energy from the wind or sun to make hydrogen, which can then be stored until needs are greatest,” says Abo-Hamed. “If we can address energy problems in the third world, we can then start to solve economic, health and education issues too.”
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